Playing Old Frame With Scourge Era Rules

When Scourge was the newest set, Magic used a rules engine that differs from today in a few specific and very important places. If you want Old Frame events to feel like that moment in time, you can keep the current rules as a base and change only the items listed here.

Everything below describes how the game worked when Scourge was the latest expansion.

1. Mulligan procedure

Scourge era Magic used the Paris Mulligan.

  • Each player draws an opening hand of seven cards.
  • Starting with the player who will take the first turn, a player who is dissatisfied with that hand may mulligan.
  • To mulligan, that player shuffles their entire hand into their library, then draws one fewer card than before. The first mulligan is to six, the next to five, and so on.
  • A player may repeat this as many times as they like, all the way down to zero cards in hand.
  • Once the starting player has decided to keep a hand (or reached zero cards), the other player may mulligan following the same procedure.

There is no additional card selection step after you finish mulliganing. Your starting hand size is exactly the number of cards you have after your last mulligan.

2. Mana pools and mana burn

In this era, mana pools and mana burn work as follows.

  • Mana sits in a player’s mana pool and can be spent later in the same phase.
  • Mana pools are not emptied between steps. They are emptied only when a phase ends.
  • At the end of each phase, any unspent mana in a player’s mana pool is lost and that player loses 1 life for each point of mana that was lost this way. This is mana burn.
  • Mana burn is loss of life, not damage. Effects that prevent or redirect damage do nothing against mana burn.

Practical consequences:

  • You can tap lands in your upkeep and still spend that mana during your draw step, because both steps are part of the same phase (the beginning phase).

3. Combat damage uses the stack

During the Scourge era, combat damage was assigned and then put on the stack before being dealt.

The sequence was:

  1. Attackers are declared. Players get priority.
  2. Blockers are declared. Players get priority.
  3. In the combat damage step, each attacking and blocking creature that is still in combat assigns its damage.
  4. All combat damage is then put on the stack as a single object.
  5. Players get priority and may play spells and abilities.
  6. When that object resolves, the assigned damage is actually dealt.

This allows typical plays associated with that era:

  • A creature can assign combat damage, then be sacrificed for an effect, and its combat damage will still be dealt when the combat damage object resolves.
  • Creatures can be pumped after damage is assigned but before it is dealt, which can matter for effects that care about how much damage is actually dealt.

4. Legendary permanents

Legendary permanents follow the old “time stamp” legend rule.

The state based effect is:

  • If two or more Legends or legendary permanents with the same name are in play, all except the one that has had that name in play for the longest time are put into their owners’ graveyards.
  • If there is a tie for “longest” (for example, two copies entered at the same time), all of them are put into their owners’ graveyards.

Important details:

  • It does not matter who controls the permanents. A legend your opponent played earlier will cause your copy to die if you play yours later.
  • This is a state-based effect. It is checked whenever a player would receive priority. You never get priority in a game state that violates the legend rule.

5. Phasing and tokens

Phasing in 2003 is not the same as phasing today.

5.1. Phasing triggers leaves play, but not enters

  • A permanent that phases out is treated as leaving play. Abilities that trigger “when this permanent leaves play” trigger when it phases out.
  • A permanent that phases in is not treated as coming into play. Abilities that trigger “when this permanent comes into play” do not trigger, and effects that modify how it comes into play are ignored.

So, for example:

  • A permanent with “When this creature leaves play, draw a card” will trigger when it phases out.
  • A permanent with “When this creature comes into play, destroy target artifact” does not trigger when it phases in.

5.2. Tokens that phase out cease to exist

In this rules snapshot there is a “phased out” zone, and tokens there do not survive:

  • Tokens in the phased out zone cease to exist as a state based effect.

That means:

  • If a creature token phases out, it disappears and will not phase back in on a later turn.
  • Any local enchantments that were attached to that token remain phased out for the rest of the game.

This is different from treating phasing as “the permanent is still on the battlefield but phased out”. Here, phasing uses its own zone, and that zone deletes tokens.

6. “Lifelink style” and “deathtouch style” abilities

When Scourge was new, the keywords “lifelink” and “deathtouch” did not yet exist as such. The game simply had cards with rules text that behaved like them.

Examples of typical templates of the time:

  • “Whenever this creature deals damage, you gain that much life.”
  • “Whenever this creature deals damage to a creature, destroy that creature. It cannot be regenerated.”

Under the Scourge era rules engine, these abilities are ordinary triggered abilities.

That implies:

  • They use the stack. When combat damage is dealt, the ability triggers and goes on the stack. Players can respond before it resolves.
  • Multiple copies of such an ability are cumulative. If a creature has two separate “whenever this creature deals damage, you gain that much life” abilities, both trigger and both resolve, gaining you twice the life.

7. “Outside the game”, Wishes and Ring of Ma’rûf

The meaning of “outside the game” in 2003 is different from the current definition.

7.1. Definition of “outside the game”

The glossary in the March 2003 Comprehensive Rules defines:

  • A card is “outside the game” if it is in the removed from the game zone, or if it is not in any of the game’s zones. “Outside the game” itself is not a zone.

So in that system:

  • Cards in the removed from the game zone are outside the game.
  • Cards in your sideboard are also outside the game, because sideboards are not zones of the game itself.

7.2. Judgment Wishes

The five Judgment Wishes are:

  • Burning Wish
  • Cunning Wish
  • Living Wish
  • Death Wish
  • Golden Wish

Their text instructs you to choose a card you own from outside the game, of the appropriate type, reveal it, and put it into your hand.

Under Scourge era rules, in sanctioned tournament play these spells can choose:

  • Any card you own in your sideboard
  • Any card you own that is currently removed from the game in this match.

So in this environment, a Judgment Wish can retrieve a suitable card that was removed from the game earlier in the match (for example, by Swords to Plowshares, Tormod’s Crypt, or another Wish).

7.3. Ring of Ma’rûf

Ring of Ma’rûf has rules text that also refers to “a card you own from outside the game”.

With the Scourge era rules in place, it follows exactly the same definition as the Wishes:

  • In tournament play, it can choose from your sideboard and from cards you own that are currently removed from the game.

8. Summary checklist for Old Frame judges

For an Old Frame event using Scourge era rules, apply the following changes to the modern rules:

  • Mulligans: use the old full hand mulligan where each mulligan draws one fewer card.
  • Mana: mana pools persist within a phase and empty only at the end of each phase, causing mana burn as loss of life.
  • Combat: combat damage is assigned, then put on the stack as a single object, and only dealt when that object resolves.
  • Legends: use the time stamp legend rule where only the oldest permanent with a given legendary name remains in play.
  • Phasing: phasing out triggers “leaves play” abilities, phasing in does not trigger “comes into play” abilities, and tokens that phase out cease to exist.
  • Lifelink style and deathtouch style effects: treat them as triggered abilities that use the stack and are cumulative.
  • Wishes and Ring of Ma’rûf: “outside the game” includes both the sideboard and cards you own that are removed from the game, so these cards may retrieve suitable cards from either place.

Reference card text and search (Scourge snapshot)
If you want to look up the exact 2003 Oracle text of any Old Frame card, you have two options:

Everything not listed here can be played exactly as in the current Comprehensive Rules.